How to Make Beef Stock



Years ago, when I was in college, I was told by my Chinese doctor to make soup from scratch for my health (the reasons too long to go into now). In his words, “get beef bones and boil them”. The good news is that I had one of those food epiphanies – soup stock comes from bones? I hadn’t connected the dots before. (So why was mom simmering that turkey carcass? Never bothered to ask.) The bad news is that I hadn’t the faintest idea what I was doing; I dutifully went to my local butcher, begged some beef bones, and boiled them for hours with a rolling boil until the bones were practically disintegrating. Then I removed the bones, added lentils and salt, and ate it. For those of you unfamiliar with the process of making stock, this is not the way to do it. (Granted, if you are calcium deficient, and don’t care about the taste of your soup, or the grittiness, it is edible.)

No, the trick with stock is to roast the bones first to get some caramelized flavor going, then to slowly heat them in water until a bare simmer, and then let them cook that way, gently, for a good long time. With beef stock, it helps to include some beef scraps or stew meat, as well as aromatic vegetables and herbs. Also a few veal bones will help provide gelatin to the stock.

Why make your own beef stock? If you make a big batch and freeze it, you may save some money. But the main reason is that you’ll get a richness of flavor and texture in your homemade stock that you just can’t buy at the store.


How to Make Beef Stock

Ingredients

beef-stock-1.jpg

  • 4-5 pounds meaty beef stock bones (with lots of marrow), including some knuckle bones if possible, cut to expose the center marrow, and include at least a couple veal bones if you can, for their gelatin
  • 1 pound of stew meat (chuck or flank steak) and/or beef scraps, cut into 2-inch chunks
  • Olive oil
  • 1-2 medium onions, peeled and quartered
  • 1-2 large carrots, cut into 1-2 inch segments
  • Handful of celery tops, or 1 large celery rib, cut into 1 inch segments
  • 2-3 cloves of garlic, unpeeled
  • Handful of parsley, stems and leaves
  • 1-2 bay leaves
  • 10 peppercorns


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